Kathmandu, September 25
A month after devastating floods struck the Nepal-China border area, families of more than 50 Ukrainian nationals are still waiting for information about their missing loved ones.
36-year-old Olena Kalinichenko was part of a group of 56 people, most of them Ukrainian, who had travelled to Mount Kailash in Tibet for a spiritual retreat. They went missing after the August 26 flood struck as they were making their way back from China into Nepal.
Kalinichenko was last seen leaving a Chinese border checkpoint roughly 15 minutes before the flood hit. She had bought chrysanthemum tea in China, planning to share it with a friend once she returned home.
Her friend Oles Vysych has been waiting a month for news of her.
“She said we’d drink tea made from the Chinese flowers together once she got home,” he said.
According to the Nepal government, more than 1,400 people have died in the floods, with over 6,000 still missing, most of them on the Nepali side of the border. Nepal says 636 foreign nationals remain missing, including 54 Ukrainians. China has reported 261 foreign nationals missing on its side, including one Ukrainian.
Nepal says it has recovered 1,451 bodies so far, but only 112 have been returned to families. The government says it has collected DNA samples from 2,035 relatives, though it has not disclosed how many bodies have been identified.
Because immigration offices and records on the Nepali side were destroyed in the floods, it has become difficult to confirm whether some individuals who left China ever entered Nepal. Chinese officials have told some families that their relatives had already left Chinese territory before the flood struck.
The group, led by spiritual teacher Irina Blonskaya, had planned to travel by bus from Tibet to Kathmandu before flying home to their respective countries. A massive surge of ice, rock, mud, and water from the mountains caused extensive damage at the Kerung border crossing used by pilgrims heading to Kailash.
Families of the missing have complained that the search and identification process has been very slow. Vladyslava Horlova, based in Norway, has been contacting the Ukrainian embassy, Norwegian police, and the Red Cross in search of her mother, and has even provided a DNA sample to police.
Even though a month has passed since the disaster, some families still hold out hope of finding their relatives alive. Vysych, Kalinichenko’s friend, says he too is trying to stay positive.
